The finalists for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize have been revealed, with Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, Anthony Doerr, and Andrea Elliott among the authors in contention for the annual literary awards.
The prizes, given in fiction and nonfiction categories, honor books “that have led readers to a better understanding of other cultures, peoples, religions, and political points of view.”
Jeffers made the fiction shortlist for The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois, a Kirkus Prize finalist and National Book Critics Circle Award winner, along with Doerr for Cloud Cuckoo Land, a National Book Award finalist. Also shortlisted for the fiction prize were Juhea Kim for Beasts of a Little Land, Patricia Engel for Infinite Country, Brad Kessler for North, and JoAnne Tompkins for What Comes After.
Elliott was named a finalist for her Pulitzer Prize–winning Invisible Child, as did Clint Smith for How the Word Is Passed, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award. Other finalists include Amanda Ripley for High Conflict, Shugri Said Salh for The Last Nomad, Heather McGhee for The Sum of Us, and Evan Osnos for Wildland.
The Dayton Literary Peace Prize was established in 2006. Previous winners have included Marlon James for The Book of Night Women, Viet Thanh Nguyen for The Sympathizer, and Ta-Nehisi Coates for We Were Eight Years in Power.
The winners of the prizes will be announced on Sept. 27.
Michael Schaub, a journalist and regular contributor to NPR, lives near Austin, Texas.
